The three of them claimed to be daring roller coaster riders, convinced there was no coaster they couldn’t conquer. And by “conquer,” I mean “allow themselves to be strapped into.”

Upon arrival, we headed straight for the worst of the worst: “Kingda Ka,” the fastest, tallest roller coaster in the world. After a ninety minute wait, we finally got on and Lisa promptly had a freak out, begging me to let her get off as we moved out of the station.

“OK, I don’t think I want to do this.”

A small man with a flock of seagulls haircut pulled the safety harness over my shoulders. Not realizing she was serious, “Haha! Me neither. 128 mph this thing goes. That’ll rip your face off.”

“If you don’t get me off this ride right now I will die. And then I’ll break up with you.”

Believing her, I raised my hand as high as the restraint would let me, which was waist level. Can we stop this? I signed to the worker sitting in the control box. She didn’t see me.

“She said they can’t stop it I think,” I told Lisa.

Right then the coaster took off. Forty seconds later we were sitting back in the station and Mr. Seagulls was taking off our harnesses.

“Christ on a crutch. That was crazy. My face hurts,” I said, turning to Lisa.

“Whatever. I had my eyes closed.”

– –

Later in the day, I paid $10 for some shitty Papa John’s breadsticks and then nearly threw them up on the twirling teacups, screamed several violent curse words in front of a group of children, was nearly broken up with a few more times, and got sunburned. I was about ready to deem it the worst day of my life, until I saw the most misleading commercial I’ve ever seen while waiting in line for the “Superman: Ultimate Flight” ride. In an effort to have it actually make sense, I took the liberty of adding a few changes.

Because nothing says delicious applesauce like early onset senile dementia.